Close the gender pay gap

What is the gender pay gap?

The gender pay gap reflects inequalities and discrimination in the labour market that mostly affect women. Women earn significantly less than men over their entire careers for complex, often interrelated reasons. These include:

differences in caring responsibilities

more women in low skilled and low paid work

outright discrimination

The current median aggregate gap for part time and full time workers is 18.4%. The current overall mean gap for full time workers is 13.7%.

Progress in closing the gap has stalled – it hasn’t changed in the last three years. There is no guarantee that the gap will close over time – it needs significant action from Government, businesses, and society.

What causes the gap?

Discrimination: It’s illegal, but some women are still paid less than men for the same work. Discrimination, particularly around pregnancy and maternity leave, remains common, with 54,000 women forced to leave their job every year after becoming a mother.

Unequal caring responsibilities: Women play a greater role in caring for children, as well as for sick or elderly relatives. As a result more women work part time, and these jobs are typically lower paid with fewer progression opportunities.

A divided labour market: Women are still more likely to be in low paid and low skilled jobs, affecting labour market segregation. 80% of those working in the low paid care and leisure sector are women, while only 10% of those in the better paid skilled trades are women.

Men in the most senior roles: Men make up the majority of those in the highest paid and most senior roles – for example, there are just seven female Chief Executives in the FTSE 100.

What progress have we made?

Our campaigning led to new gender pay gap reporting legislation, which requires organisations with over 250 employees to publish data on their gender pay gaps, including bonuses, by April 2018. We want employers to see this as an opportunity to address the productivity gap, as tackling workplace inequality could help 840,000 women into work and would allow them to reach their full potential. Read our Gender Pay Gap reporting deadline briefing here.

What can I do if my company has a gender pay gap?

The deadline for publishing gender pay gap data is an important moment for employees and employers across the country to have a conversation about equality in the workplace.

As we have seen with the BBC, often that conversation will turn to equal pay, or pay discrimination. Everyone has a right under the Equality Act 2010, no matter what your contract might say, to talk about their pay if it is for the purposes of helping women, or people with other protected characteristics such as race or disability, to establish if they have been discriminated against. So this is the right time to have that discussion.

You can also talk to your manager, and ask them to see your company’s action plan to close the gap. You can join a union, or if you are already in one ask your union representative what they are doing to advance pay equality. And to build solidarity, you can join your firm’s women’s network (or gender equality network) – or start one, if there isn’t one.

What is Fawcett campaigning for?

We are campaigning for employers to:

Advertise all jobs in their organisation as flexible, part-time or a job share unless there is a strong business case not to.

Support women to progress to higher paid jobs, and tackle unconscious bias and use targets to measure progress.

Become a living wage employer – over 60% of those earning less that the living wage are women.

We want the governmentto:

Implement meaningful penalties for employers who do not comply with gender pay gap reporting rules.

Create targets for apprenticeships and aim for 50:50 recruitment. Apprenticeships are publically funded but at the moment the ones in the highest paid sectors remain dominated by men. There is a £2,000 gender pay gap at apprenticeship level.

Latest

25 APRIL 2019: Join us for an evening with Caroline Criado Perez, award-winning campaigner and author of Invisible Women, and journalist Helen Lewis for a provocative conversation on how the gender data gap shapes our world.

The Fawcett Society is the UK’s leading membership charity campaigning for gender equality and women’s rights. If you believe in a society where no one is prevented from reaching their full potential because of their gender, join us today.

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The Fawcett Society is the UK’s leading membership charity campaigning for gender equality and women’s rights. If you believe in a society where no one is prevented from reaching their full potential because of their gender, join us today.

Millicent Fawcett began campaigning for women’s equality in 1866, and was instrumental in achieving first votes for women in 1918. At The Fawcett Society, we’ve continued her legacy of fighting sexism through impactful research and hard-hitting campaigns for over 150 years.

We’re delighted to have a growing number of active and effective local women’s rights meet ups, who work in the local community to enforce change and campaign on our behalf. Their work is invaluable to Fawcett.

Inspire others: Volunteer with Future Fawcett

2018 marks 100 years since women first secured the right to vote, and we're marking it by launching Future Fawcett, an education outreach programme to inspire young people through our suffrage history, and teach them about women's rights today.

We need volunteers to make it happen. Are you ready to inspire the next generation of feminists?

Don't let the clock turn back on women's rights. Donate today.

We've been fighting for over 150 years to win hard-earned rights for women living in Britain. With Brexit on the horizon, it's more important than ever that we stand together to defend them. Will you stand with us, and help end gender inequality for good?